Ladder bracket



April 20, 1965 Filed Jan. 8, 1962 c. 1.. ROWLETTE 3,179,205

LADDER BRACKET 3 Sheets-Sheet 1 q Fig. 2

as c o o g! 40 T 4/ 30 a? )NVENTO/l? Claude L Roy/aria April 1965 c. ROWLETTE LADDER BRACKET Filed Jan. 8, 1962 5 Sheets-Sheet 2 April 1955 c. L. ROWLETTE 3,179,205

LADDER BRACKET Filed Jan. 8, 1962 INVENTUI? Claude L Raw/aria Attorney United States Patent 3,179,205 LADDER BRAUKET Claude L. Rowlette, 25 W. 1st St., Franklin, Shin Filed Jan. 8, 1962, Ser. No. 164,652 1 Claim. (Cl. 182-121) This invention relates to a novel ladder bracket. Generally, there is provided an elongated platform of approximately ladder width supported by and between a pair of parallel L-shaped frame members. The downwardly extending legs of the L-shaped frame members have hooks on their rear surfaces for engaging over the rungs of a ladder. A pair of safety rods prevent accidental unhooking. At the front edge of the platform, there is a relatively. long transversely extending bar having a rubber pad or cushion on its front surface for engagement against a building wall or roof. The transverse bar is mounted on a slidable extension that provides length adjustment for the platform.

It is an object of the present invention to provide a ladder bracket of simple, rugged, safe and yet economical construction.

It is a further object of the invention to provide a device of the character set forth which is capable of being folded.

It is another object of the invention to provide a device of the character set forth having safe and sure means for adjusting the length of its platform.

It is a further object of the invention to provide a device of the character set forth having ground penetrating feet on its vertical legs so that the device can be used as a low platform or scaffold support apart from a ladder.

It is yet another object of the invention to provide a ladder bracket having rung engaging hooks so designed as to be easily adjusted to ladders of different spacings between rungs.

Other and further objects of the invention will become apparent from a reading of the following specification, taken in conjunction with the drawings, in which:

FIGURE 1 is a perspective view of a preferred embodiment of the invention illustrating the step of height location thereof;

FIGURE 2 is a perspective view illustrating a typical use of the ladder bracket as a work platform;

FIGURE 3 is an enlarged plan view of the ladder bracket with its slidable extension partially extended;

FIGURE 4 is a plan view, similar to FIGURE 3, with the platform extension retracted and with an attachment added for spanning a building corner;

FIGURE 5 is an elevational view, in section, taken on line 5-5 of FIGURE 3;

FIGURE 6 is an enlarged fragmentary elevational view, in section, taken on line 6-6 of FIGURE 4;

FIGURE 7 is a side elevational view of the showing of FIGURE 2 with the near ladder rail cut away;

FIGURE 8 is a perspective view showing the adjustable construction of certain of the rung hooks;

FIGURE 9 is a side elevational view of a modified form of the invention;

FIGURE 10 is a side view of the device of FIGURE 7 showing its use as a low platform apart from a ladder; and,

FIGURE 11 is a fragmentary elevational view of a modification of the ladder bracket for use with ladders having square rungs.

With reference to FIGURES 1 through 8 of the drawings, numeral 21 generally designates the novel ladder brackets, while numeral 22 generally designates a conventional ladder with which the same is readily adapted to be used either to provide a work platform extending between a wall surface or a roof and a ladder, or to provide, when used with one or more similar brackets, supporting means for scaffold structure supported by said brackets. The frame of ladder bracket 21 comprises a pair of spaced horizontally extending parallel arms 23 and 24 and a pair of equally spaced parallel vertically disposed legs 25 and 26 interconnected at their rear and upper ends, respectively, as best seen in FIGURE 7, at an angle of the order of approximately so that the platform of the ladder bracket will be disposed horizontally when ladder 22 is at an angle of approximately 15 from the vertical. Arms 23 and 24 and legs 25 and 26 are formed of wood, hollow metallic tubes, not shown, or other suitable material as desired.

The rear portions of the top surfaces of arms 23 and 24.- and the rear surfaces of legs 25 and 26 are desirably capped by protecting and strengthening channel bars 27, while the under surfaces of arms 23 and 24 and the front face of legs 25 and 26 are similarly capped by channel bars 28. Channel bars 27 and 28 are fixed to the arms and legs by any suitable means such as screws 29, and by bolts 30, which latter also serve to attach a pair of braces 31, which rigidly maintain the arms and legs of the ladder bracket in their relative positions shown.

Ladder bracket 21 is quickly and easily attachable to any three consecutive rungs 33, 34 and. 35 of ladder 22by three pairs of inverted J-shaped hooks 36, 37 and 38, formed of metal straps and fixed to arms 25 and 26 as, for example, by screws or bolts 39. The upper pair of hooks 36 has a safety locking pin 48 insertable in aligned apertures in each hook 36 immediately below rung 33, FIGURE 7. Each pin 40 is provided with a chain 41 for preventing loss thereof, in known manner.

The straps of the intermediate pair of hooks 37 are provided with vertically elongated screw-receiving slot 42 to permit limited vertical adjustment of hooks 37 t0 compensate for variation in the spacing between rungs of different ladders. The lowermost hooks 38 are set so as to allow a slight clearance above the run 35, indicated by numeral 43, so that hooks 38 will not need to be adjusted when used with ladders having the rungs somewhat closer together than average spacing. Hooks 38 have longer shanks than the other pairs of hooks so that the lower ends thereof can be bent vertically downwardly at 44 to provide desirable ground penetrating feetfor holding ladder bracket 21 in the position thereof shown in FIGURE 10, whereby the same may be used as a low work platform or scaffold support apart from a ladder or ladders.

An elongated platform panel 45 of wood, plywood, reinforced plastics, metal or other suitable material is rigidly fixed to the upper surfaces of arms 23 and 24, as best seen in FIGURE 5. To adjust the position of plat- .form 45 relative to the wall of a building, a wall-engaging transverse bar 46, having a front facing pad 47 of rubber or other resilient protective material thereon, is slidably mounted on ladder bracket 21 by a pair of L-shaped channel bars 48 and 49. The short legs of channel bars 48 and 49 are fixed to the ends of transverse bar 46 by bolts 50 which also anchor the outer ends of a pair of braces 51 thereto. The longer legs of channel bars 48 and 49 extend along and embrace opposite edges of the platform panel 45 and have their lower flanges received in longitudinally extending grooves 52 in frame arms 23 and 24. The long legs of channel bars 48 and 49 are provided with pairs of aligned equally spaced apertures 53 for receiving therethrough a pair of rods 54 which likewise pass through similarly spaced and aligned apertures in frame arms 23 and 24. The ends of rods 54 are threaded to receive wing nuts 55 which firmly fix the rods in selected pairs of aligned apertures in arms 23 and 24 and in channel bars 48 and 49, as illustrated by the relative adjusted positions of FIGURES 3 and 4.

3 In order that ladder bracket 21 can be placed at and against the corner of a building either for use alone or in conjunction with one or two similar ladder brackets for supporting scaffold planks at or around the corner of a building, there may be provided an attachment, generally designated 56 (FIGURES 4 and 6). The attachment 56 comprises a metal strap 57 bent at its center at right angles to embrace the corner of a building, not shown, and attached to another metal strip 58, as by welding. Braces 59 are employed to hold the straps 57 and 53 rigidly in the assembled relative positions of FIGURE 4. A pair of integral extensions 60 extend rearwardly from the upper edge of strap 58 and are then bent downwardly at 61 to somewhat resiliently embrace transverse bar 46 for quick and easy frictional coupling and uncoupling of attachment 56to and from the transverse bar 46.

In the modified form of the invention illustrated in FIGURE 9, a pair of platform supporting arms 91 are pivotally connected by pins 92 to a pair of vertically disposed frame legs 93 so that the ladder bracket can be readily folded about pivot pins 92 for facilitating transportation and storage. A removable safety locking pin 94 enters aligned apertures in arms 91 and 93 to prevent collapsing of the ladder bracket during use. A chain 95 or other flexible connector supports the weight of the user and/or the scaffold positioned on arm 91. Chain .95'has at its upper end a hook 96 for quick detachable connection to a ladder rung, as shown. The other elements of FIGURE 9 are substantially identical to like elements in the species of FIGURES 1 through 8 and are designated by primednumerals corresponding to their counterparts indicated by unprimed numerals in the first described species.

FIGURE 11 differs from the disclosures of FIGURES 7 and 9 only in the rectangular shape of a hook 101 for engagement over a rectangular rung 102. A ladder 103 and frame leg 104 correspond to ladder 22 and frame legs 23 and 24 in the species of FIGURES 1 through 8. Protective and strengthening channel strips 105 and 106 correspond to the equivalent channel members 27 and 28 in the first described species. To use the ladder bracket, the worker first decides on the length of the platform needed, for example, to extend under wide eaves or over a gutter and onto a roof. Rods 54- are theninserted in aligned apertures selected to produce the desired platform length and the wing nuts 55 are screwed on the ends of rods 54. Next, the ladder is set up in reversed position and the worker climbs up to hook the ladder bracket onto the ladder, as shown in FIGURE 1. The ladder is now turned around'to position the assemblage as shown'in FIGURE 2. Scaffold planks may be laid to span the space or spaces between two or more ladder brackets, one of which can be placed at a building corner by use of attachment 56 of FIGURE 4.

While several embodiments of the invention have been disclosed, it is understood that many changes can be made in the size, shape, composition and arrangement of the parts without departing from the spirit of the invention as defined by the appended claim.

What is claimed is:

A ladder bracket comprising a pair of spaced L-shaped frame members each having a horizontally disposed arm and a vertically disposed leg, a platform member extending between and fastened to said arms, a plurality of vertically aligned pairs of hooks attached to the rear surfaces of said legs for engagement over the rungs of a ladder, a transversely disposed abutment bar considerably longer than the width of said platform member positioned adjacent the front edge of said platform member, and means including a pair of channel bars for adjustably connecting said abutment bar to said ladder bracket to vary the effective length of said platform member, the uppermost pair of said hooks having pin and chain locking means for preventing accidental unhooking thereof from a ladder rung, the lowermost of said hooks having abnormally deep hook sockets therein to clear the 'upper surfaces of rungs received therein and thus allowing firm seating of others of said hooks on another rung, an intermediate pair of said hooks being vertically adjustable relative to said legs whereby the vertically spaced hooks can be made to seat firmly on rungs having somewhat different vertical spacings therebetween, the lower ends of said legs having ground-penetrating anchoring elements extending downwardly therefrom, whereby said ladder bracket can be used as a low platform or scaffold support apart from a ladder, said anchoring elements being extensions of the shanks of the lowermost pair of said hooks, the means for adjustably connecting said abutment bar to said ladder bracket comprising said pair of channel bars embracing at least portions of the outer lateral surfaces of said arms, tie rods passing through alignable apertures in said channel bars and said arms, and wing nuts for fixing said tie rods in selected sets of said apertures.

References Cited by the Examiner UNITED STATES PATENTS 271,509 1/83 Nolton 182-121 662,566 11/00 Jones 182-214 966,244 8/10 Ruck 248-238 1,423,725 7/22 Mohr 182-120 2,174,891 10/39 Maran 182-121 2,605,950 8/52 Colvin 182-214 2,656,223 10/53 Gray 182-121 2,710,129 6/55 Telech 182-214 2,722,360 11/55 Malm 182-108 FOREIGN PATENTS 752,280 7/56 a Great Britain. 1,193,183 4/59 France.

HARRISON R. MOSELEY, Primary Examiner.

FRANK B. SHERRY, Examiner. 

